A 56-year-old University of Washington employee accused of paying to have sex with two teenage girls he groomed online before traveling to their home cities to meet up with them in hotels has pleaded not guilty to a half dozen charges.
Grant Lee Hough, the UW’s general manager of residential dining, was arrested by Seattle police June 16 and charged two days later with six felonies, including sexual exploitation of a minor and commercial sexual abuse of a minor, court records show.
King County Senior Deputy Prosecutor Laura Harmon wrote in charging documents that Hough continued to sexually exploit a 13-year-old girl from Pierce County even after learning the mother of a Benton County 15-year-old had contacted police. He used encrypted and auto-deleting messages to avoid detection, bought one girl a cellphone so her parents wouldn’t discover their conduct and recorded a sexual encounter with the younger girl, she wrote.
“He has a substantial disregard for the safety of minors and a prioritization of his sexual desires over all else,” Harmon wrote of Hough.
He is accused of sexually abusing the 15-year-old between December and March and the 13-year-old from February to May, charging papers say. Hough paid the girls through cash apps and with shoes and clothing, alcohol, marijuana and vape products; he also had Grubhub food deliveries sent to the 15-year-old’s house, according to the charges.
The investigation into Hough began in March, when the 15-year-old’s mother found sexually explicit messages and photos on her daughter’s cellphone and contacted the Benton County sheriff’s office, the charges say. A sheriff’s detective identified Hough, a Seattle resident, as the suspect and obtained his Google records, which included a video of him having sex with the 13-year-old, the charges say.
The sheriff’s detective contacted a Seattle police detective in May and sent him the case file. The Seattle police detective then started his own investigation into Hough, leading to the charges that were filed last week.
“Hough is a sexual predator who groomed and sexually assaulted multiple juveniles, including the female victims identified to date,” the Seattle police detective wrote in charging papers. “Hough would meet girls online, arrange to be their ‘sugar daddy,’ and engage in sexual activities with the females … in exchange (for) money and items of monetary value, including food, marijuana and vape products.
“These sexual encounters often, if not always, occurred in hotel settings,” the detective wrote.
In messages to the 13-year-old, Hough offered her $1,000 to have sex with her and one of her friends, and wrote that he had had paid sex with several other girls, the charges say. Hough, who is white, also told the 13-year-old he had been fantasizing about “taboo race play,” in which he would pretend to be a racist and degrade her during sex, according to the charges.
Members of the Washington Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force, made up of Seattle police officers and agents from the FBI and Homeland Security Investigations, served a warrant on Hough’s Wallingford home on June 16 and took him into custody, the charges say.
Near his front door, officers found a carry-on suitcase that is described in charging papers as a “to-go sex kit,” filled with sex toys, packs of fishnet stockings, zip ties, lubricant and other sex-related items.
Hough remains jailed in lieu of $750,000 bail. Should he post bail, Hough will be on electronic home monitoring and was ordered by the court not to leave the state without permission, not to have contact with any minors and not to use or possess devices capable of accessing the internet unless monitoring software is installed, the records say.
Sexual assault protection orders were also issued, barring him from contacting his two alleged victims.
Harmon noted in charging papers that child rape charges weren’t filed here, because the evidence shows those offenses happened outside King County but that cases will be referred to other counties as appropriate.
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